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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/26431450">Sandcastle</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/Rosage/pseuds/Rosage'>Rosage</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>The Arcana (Visual Novel)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Other, Trans Julian Devorak, warnings and notes inside</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-09-12</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-09-12</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-06 03:54:50</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Teen And Up Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>3,590</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/26431450</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/Rosage/pseuds/Rosage</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Julian is a marine biologist. Asra is a free-spirited artist. By the sea, they seek to belong.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Asra/Julian Devorak</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>4</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>37</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>Sandcastle</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>- <i>Content warnings</i>: Though an otherwise lighthearted AU, this retains some of Julian and Asra’s canon traumas. Julian’s narration touches on topics typical to him, including mental health, self-sabotage, briefly referenced suicidal ideation, briefly referenced disordered eating, and briefly referenced drowning. Also, be aware he is not a totally reliable narrator.</p>
<p>- For canonverse fics, I use the game’s terminology, including he/him pronouns and gender-neutral terms for Asra. For this setting, I switched at random between the pronouns most recently listed online (he/they).</p>
<p>- Asra more or less lives with MC and Muriel, with a tendency to wander. MC and Muriel live over Selasi’s bakery. Portia/Nadia is established off-screen within the fic.</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>The waves lapping against the beach bring Julian home even now, when the sea floods his nightmares, and his apartment hides in the city. He could be a teen, with Pasha yanking him toward the water; he could be in uniform, hiding his tremor while lining up at the docks; he could be administering CPR to someone spluttering their last breath beneath his hands.</p>
<p>Instead, he stands with arms crossed over his open shirt, far enough from his coworkers to be alone. No, not alone—down the beach, a figure sits on a beach chair in front of an easel. Only the scientists should be there, with Pasha and Nadia out of town. Julian strides over as much as he can while slipping in the sand.</p>
<p>“Excuse me, but this is private property,” he says.</p>
<p>Star-shaped sunglasses render the person unreadable. Sun shines off their sea foam hair and golden brown skin, and their shirt is tied up above their stomach. “You don’t look like a cop.”</p>
<p>“Thank god. I usually consider private property a, ah, guideline, but this is my sister’s house.”</p>
<p>The stranger lowers their sunglasses to peer up at Julian, violet eyes no more revealing than before, and Julian’s tongue turns to sand.</p>
<p>“Oh! You’re Portia’s brother?” they ask.</p>
<p>“You know her?”</p>
<p>“She married my friend.”</p>
<p>“Nadia, then!” The stranger’s lips lift the slightest bit, unsteadying Julian as he holds out a hand. “Pardon my manners. I’m Ilya, that is, I go by Julian, but Ilya’s fine—“</p>
<p>“Asra.” They hold up rainbow-splattered fingers. Julian drops his own a second too late. “I’m just painting here, so…”</p>
<p>Julian bends to examine the canvas. Though it’s past sunrise, the painting depicts the beach in pinks and oranges, the wide strokes veering on impressionism. The empty horizon has sprouted an island of palm trees, if that’s what the purple curves represent. Pictures Pasha has sent of the beach house feature similar artwork. She and Nadia preened over a portrait of Pasha as a mermaid in an underwater palace, a string of pearls glowing around her neck.</p>
<p>“It’s very, ah, imaginative,” Julian says. “My team’s back there. Marine biologists, we’ll be around.”</p>
<p>“Nadi mentioned something like that. I’m not in your way, am I?”</p>
<p>“No, no. I’ll, uh, leave you to it.”</p>
<p>He spins around. His heart pounds as always, even when there’s nothing more active than the surf, nothing but a painter at work. When he looks over his shoulder, Asra has lowered the sunglasses again, not that they seem interested in the tint of the world around them.</p><hr/>
<p>The next day, Julian needs not only sunglasses, but a floppy hat to stave off the sun. His new sunblock has already failed him.</p>
<p>He chatters with his team around the tide pool they’re surveying. It’s like poking through someone else’s village, a whole system coexisting, playing their own roles. The human body is more familiar, its parts more or less in a consistent order, but Julian never wants to dissect it again.</p>
<p>He’d stay there, immersed in a home that’s not his, while everyone took their lunch break—but when he peeks, he finds Asra lounging on a towel, a sketchbook out and their sundress tucked away from the sand. Shyness quickens Julian’s pace, until he’s towering over Asra, casting them in shadow. They look alarmed for half a second before becoming as smooth as a shell.</p>
<p>“Hey, Ilya-Julian. Nice shirt.”</p>
<p>Socks lie scrunched next to Asra’s abandoned sandals, so they have no room to make fun of Julian’s half-buttoned floral top. He crouches and dangles a bag of chips in offering. Whether or not he eats, he always packs lunch, just in case someone else forgets. Meeting a sunset of a person in his sisters’ backyard isn’t a bad reason, either.</p>
<p>Asra makes space, which Julian rushes to fill like water. The towel is Portia’s, printed with paw shapes. It lets Julian almost sit still.</p>
<p>When he asks about the sketchbook, Asra closes it. “They’re just doodles. Did you meet many animals?”</p>
<p>Julian describes the tide pool’s residents while Asra munches on chips. After they’re covered in crumbs, the two swap stories about Nadia, until Asra says, “I think your friends are looking for you.”</p>
<p>“My what? Oh!” Rather than dive back into work, Julian lingers, tugged between two currents. “You have a favorite chip flavor, by the way?”</p>
<p>“Surprise me,” Asra says, and Julian is buoyant.</p><hr/>
<p>The following days pass similarly, a different flavor each time. Asra shifts between patches of beach, sometimes reading and sipping bubble tea, sometimes painting a landscape the same colors as their slushie. Julian rambles about his research and shows off photos of sea creatures on his phone.</p>
<p>A few days in, Asra swipes the phone. When they return it, it has a new contact: <em>Asra ;3 (he/they)</em></p>
<p>Julian’s heart trills. He meant to ask, both for the number and the pronouns, but Asra seems to swim around questions. “Do you have a preference?” Julian asks anyway.<br/>
<br/>
“Nah. Cutie works, though.” They match their emoticon, and Julian hopes his sunburn hides his hot skin.</p>
<p>“You got it, cutie.” Julian sends a text immediately—or after a few attempts to get the right level of flirty. When Asra gets out their phone, their face lights up, and Julian beams. He waits with a jittery leg for a ping that doesn’t come.</p>
<p>“Did it, uh, go through?” Julian asks.</p>
<p>“Huh?”</p>
<p>“My text, uh, I was testing the number?”</p>
<p>“Oh! Sorry, my friends are looking after my snake.” Asra shows off a photo of a ball python wrapped around a beefy forearm. “I invited them, but one of them doesn’t come to the beach anymore.”</p>
<p>“A friend, or the snake?”</p>
<p>A shadow passes over Asra. “Both.”</p>
<p><em>Cheerful topics, cheerful topics</em>. “I used to have a dog.”</p>
<p>“Used to?”<br/>
<br/>
Not so cheerful. Julian picks out a funny story about her anyway. It hardly matters, with Asra still scrolling through snake pictures. Faust, apparently, a name so ominous Julian doesn’t ask more.</p><hr/>
<p>Whenever possible, Julian has dinner and drinks with his coworkers or old friends in the area. Normally, he’d ignore his phone unless his family needed him—but at random times, he starts receiving pictures of blobfish and urchins with hats, captioned with strings of symbols he can’t dissect.</p>
<p>After he can’t put it off, he returns to his motel. Though Pasha offered him the beach house, he refused to impose—just as well, since Asra is staying there (a terrible decision, since Asra is staying there). He reads the news, takes his meds, and lies on his back, his side, his stomach.</p>
<p>He tries the other side and rolls too far, into a whirlpool that sucks in one ship, two, ten. His parents scream. Pasha cries in his arms, a pink toddler who flops out as she grows, morphing into an adult mermaid his child self can’t hold. As the sea swirls, the horizon melts into a different view.</p>
<p><em>Torpedo, </em>someone shouts. The deck collapses. He slams the ocean’s surface. Saltwater burns his mouth, his throat, his lungs…</p>
<p>He wakes in a torrent of sweat, sore from his fall out of bed, his sheets tangled around his legs. Untangling himself, he gropes for his phone. It’s past Mazelinka’s bedtime. Pasha is in another time zone, but she’s gallivanting with her lovely wife, on vacation away from their vacation home.</p>
<p>Still on the floor, he scrolls through his text chain with Asra. He types impulsively.</p>
<p>
  <em>You ever think about sinking to the bottom of the sea?</em>
</p>
<p>It’s 3:02, too late to expect anything. He receives a photo of a pigfish, its long snout pressed against the camera.</p>
<p>
  <em>say hi to this guy while you’re there</em>
</p>
<p><em>I’m serious</em>, Julian types before deleting it. Asra might as well be a stranger, one who prefers to float along the surface. Julian texts facts about pigfish (orthopristis chrysoptera), and they go back and forth, images and information, until he’s left on read.<br/>
<br/>
A reply comes late the next morning.</p>
<p>
  <em>sorry fell asleep</em>
</p>
<p>The idea floods him with warmth—Asra’s cheek pressed next to the phone, white eyelashes fluttering shut, while Julian’s latest squid trivia glows in the dark room.</p><hr/>
<p>When he’s not burying himself in work, Julian thinks about asking Asra to dinner, or the bar, or maybe the museum. The zoo, he decides, and then doesn’t ask. Seeing Asra anywhere but the beach would be like passing a starfish in town.</p>
<p>It’s surreal enough the evening Asra invites him into the beach house. Along the way, Asra tends the lavender garden while Julian investigates the porch’s swinging bench. Inside the white wood cottage, splashes of color announce Asra’s impact: mermaid Pasha in her full glory, painted animal figurines, a bright clay pot. The rattan furnishings are all Nadia. Pasha’s touches—the hand-sewn pillows, the empty cat food bowls—put Julian at ease.</p>
<p>More food wrappers and linens are strewn about than either of his sisters would allow. Seashell jewelry and other unfinished crafts take over the table.</p>
<p>“Nadi helped me set up a shop online, but it’s a lot to keep track of,” Asra says.<br/>
<br/>
“We can’t all be as organized as Nadia.” Julian rifles through the cupboards. “Can I get you anything?”</p>
<p>“I was going to offer you tea, but…” Asra shrugs and reclines on the couch, sheltered by a potted plant. Julian puts a kettle on the stove.</p>
<p>Since more things are piled on the chairs, Julian stretches out on the floor, leaning against the couch. Asra’s legs rest lightly against his back while Asra flips through TV channels. He doesn’t make it more than a few minutes through any movie, and any time a show goes to commercials, he clicks away. It’s too many changes with that gentle, steady touch against Julian’s collar. Neck flaring, he leaps up.<br/>
<br/>
“Sorry, forgot to call my grandma! That is, she was dating my grandma, who isn’t alive or technically my grandma—”</p>
<p>“You don’t have to explain.”</p>
<p>Julian dips out onto the porch. The moon reflects on the water, with fireflies imitating it in jumps and starts. He sits on the bench and pulls out his phone.</p>
<p>“Mazelinka! Spry as ever, I see.”<br/>
<br/>
“You know you can’t see. Why don’t you do those video calls, like Pasha?”</p>
<p>“Don’t worry, I’m still handsome. I’m at Pasha’s beach house.”</p>
<p>“Isn’t she abroad?”</p>
<p>“Nadia’s friend invited me in.”</p>
<p>“Are you ignoring your host? Don’t be rude, boy!”</p>
<p>Julian winces. He only keeps Mazelinka’s soothing gravel voice on the line for a minute.</p>
<p>Playing cards—Pasha must have some somewhere. Julian swings the bench, rocking like a boat at sea before heading back inside.</p><hr/>
<p>On one of Julian’s days off, Asra tells him to bring a swimsuit. He happily obliges.</p>
<p>Asra stands at the surf’s edge in a purple, translucent shawl that seems more bother than it’s worth. He sheds it to beckon Julian into the water. Julian dives after him, their feet kicking up spray. When the water flows cold around Julian’s waist, he hesitates. He studies their surroundings for a rip current or anything else that could pull them in.</p>
<p>“What’s wrong?” Asra asks.</p>
<p>“Oh, you know. Sharks.” Summoning a grin, Julian splashes him. Asra laughs and retaliates. They all but wrestle in the surf, their push and pull drawing them deep enough to swim before Julian realizes. He embraces it, chest light and throat sore from laughter. The water parts smoothly before his long limbs.</p>
<p>They duck their heads to spy on fish and pet seaweed, the slimy leaves swaying against Julian’s palm. They both surface, their dripping faces inches apart, Asra’s expression unchanged from how he studied the underwater kingdom. Julian leans in.</p>
<p>Asra ducks around to murmur in his ear. “Come with me.” His wet cheek brushes against Julian’s as he pulls away. Sputtering, Julian treads water. He flails after Asra.</p>
<p>They arrive on shore and towel off. The water still beads in Asra’s curls when he takes Julian’s hand and guides him to a rocky outcropping.</p>
<p>“What is this?” Julian asks.<br/>
<br/>
“A surprise.”</p>
<p>Asra takes hold of a chunk of rock and swings himself up. Julian stands below, poised to catch him, until Asra perches at the top. He waves down, the shawl again draped around his shoulders, backlit by the sun. Julian scrambles up after him. They drop down into a little section of beach that’s hidden on all sides. A seagull lands on the rock, ruining their privacy before taking off.</p>
<p>“Nobody ever comes here,” Asra says. “It’s quiet. You just hear the waves.”</p>
<p>It’s like a turtle sharing their shell. An urge grips Julian to encircle Asra like the outcropping. Instead, he listens to the water, trying to bottle up what makes Asra like this place.</p>
<p>“You looked like you could use the shade,” Asra says, eyes amused as he takes in Julian. Julian digs around in his bag for his latest, triple-extra-strength sunscreen.</p>
<p>“Not with this in my arsenal. Er, missed my back, though. Care to help me, cutie?” He turns around, grinning over his shoulder.</p>
<p>His bravado washes away when Asra takes the bottle. Warm hands work in gentle circles around his shoulder blades and down his back. He bites his lip as Asra finds the ticklish edge of a rib, but then he skirts back up to Julian’s sunburned shoulder, and Julian has to bite harder.</p>
<p>“Asra—”<br/>
<br/>
“Sorry—”</p>
<p>Julian turns around again, and whatever Asra sees transforms his concern into something else.</p>
<p>Julian’s slick back meets rough rock, his feet sliding down the sand to help Asra reach his mouth. Asra’s lips probe, too soft, too slow. Julian’s hold is slippery at Asra’s waist as he pulls his heat closer. The shawl slips off Asra’s shoulders to bend over Julian’s wrists, feather-light, jolting him. Asra’s hands frame his jaw, a raft at sea.</p>
<p>They could stay until the tide comes in, but Julian would drown right here, like this.</p><hr/>
<p>“The suckers should be spaced out.”<br/>
<br/>
“It’s called art, Ilya.”</p>
<p>Julian lies on a towel, his head in Asra’s lap. Their free hand cards through Julian’s hair, making him too malleable to complain about their abstractions. As they draw, Julian talks about his times at sea. His rowdier stories lose Asra, as they point out all the holes, but the animal ones seem to please them.</p>
<p>“A jellyfish stung me once. Actually, you remind me of one.” Minus the transparency.</p>
<p>“I sting you?”</p>
<p>Julian rubs a hickey he hopes passes as sunburn to his coworkers. Given their looks lately, it’s doubtful. It wouldn’t stop him from letting Asra use him as a canvas, if they wanted, whether for teeth or glitter or ink.</p>
<p>“They’re lovely, and they bob along at their own pace,” Julian says.</p>
<p>Asra hums approval. “What are you, then?”</p>
<p>“A seahorse.”</p>
<p>“Cute, but why?”</p>
<p>“The men carry eggs. When I was younger, my mentor got me a custom binder with a seahorse print.” He still owns it, even though he’s shirtless on the beach now, because he can be. “Besides, you don’t think I’d gallop around the ocean?”</p>
<p>“Oh, I’m sure.”</p>
<p>The sun sets, bleeding all the tones in Asra’s palette. They stop drawing to watch. It draws Julian into their art, their mind, if only for a moment. After all color flees from the sky, cold air invades Julian’s bare chest.</p>
<p>“Let’s camp out tonight,” Asra says. Julian questions the logistics, but his heart has already agreed.</p>
<p>They grab supplies from the cottage and clamber into the secret slice of beach. Waving away insects, they set up their bedding. <em>Safe from most threats</em>, Julian thinks, though he holds Asra close between the blankets. Smells of incense and paint mix with the salt Julian calls home, and Asra’s hair feels soft between his fingers.</p>
<p>“What were the best sea creatures you ever met?” Asra asks.</p>
<p>“Seals,” Julian whispers. “They adopted Pasha and I the night…” He swallows. “Well, it was just us.”</p>
<p>After he quit not only the navy, but all medical work, he went back to school. Humans couldn’t take care of him anymore, or he couldn’t let them. Maybe the seals would instead.</p>
<p>“Seals are nice like that.” Almost absently, Asra nuzzles the chest hair that took so long to grow. “My friend and I were alone on the beach, too. I used to imagine it was more exciting than it was, just to get through the night. I guess my art hasn’t really changed.” They laugh dryly.</p>
<p>“Nothing wrong with that.” He kisses their temple. It doesn’t matter if it’s the beach, or a cottage, or just Julian’s arms—he wants Asra to find a home with him.</p>
<p>The thought douses Julian in cold water. He barely recognizes his own apartment, his own reflection. He paces all night, eats half-meals out of the fridge, and wakes up his sisters by forgetting time zones. Where could he transplant Asra that wouldn’t make life worse?</p>
<p>Every sandcastle gets kicked down. Soon, his team’s funding will run out, and he’ll leave this beach’s bubble before it pops. They can put their fling behind them, for Asra’s sake.</p>
<p>Julian tries not to let his breathing stutter as Asra drifts off against him.</p><hr/>
<p>The day Julian leaves, he doesn’t say goodbye. He never even told Asra when the study would end, and Asra never asked. It’s unethical not to release specimens.</p>
<p>Julian's phone pings throughout the day, then sporadically in the following days, until it stops. He doesn’t read the texts. It’s hard to resist when he lies awake at night, but he imagines every awful thing Asra must be calling him, every fault on display.</p>
<p>As always, he throws himself into work. If while writing up the results of his research, he writes self-deprecating diary entries, nobody has to know.</p>
<p>One day, while he’s in his apartment with his fifth cup of coffee, Pasha calls. She interrupts his greeting.</p>
<p>“What gives, Ilya?”</p>
<p>“What gives what?”</p>
<p>“Asra keeps asking if he did something wrong. I had to tell him you’re just an idiot. I should have known better than to set you up.”</p>
<p>Julian begins pacing, only to stop short. “Wait, what?”<br/>
<br/>
“Oh, hey, Nadia just pulled some cookies out of the oven—”</p>
<p>“Pasha! What did you do?”<br/>
<br/>
“Nothing! It’s just, Nadia’s friend seemed lonely, and you seemed sad. I thought you'd loosen up if I booked you the house with him. But you were all, <em>oh, I could never!</em> Although…”</p>
<p>“Although?”<br/>
<br/>
“It’s not like it made a difference.”</p>
<p>Imagining waking up to Asra dripping shower water, Julian begs to differ. Still, she has a point. It didn’t take her meddling to draw him to Asra like a lighthouse in a fog.</p>
<p>After she hangs up, Julian scrolls through Asra’s texts. Pictures of alien-like deep sea creatures, images with jokes Julian doesn’t understand, a link to an aquatic discovery. Then:</p>
<p>
  <em>where are you? are you ok?</em>
</p>
<p>
  <em>did i miss you say you were leaving? </em>
</p>
<p>Not a bad assumption, given Asra. Julian’s stomach plummets as he scrolls past more pictures.</p>
<p>
  <em>i know i’m easy to leave</em>
</p>
<p>A final sea urchin in a top hat follows, as if it can hide the sentiment.</p>
<p>Julian drops onto his bed, sitting with his arms slack between his knees. His fog clears to reveal an awful point of clarity.</p>
<p>He types a reply and edits it five times before hitting send.</p><hr/>
<p>A tie-dye shirt stands out between the drab shelves. It feels like a hallucination to see Asra seated at the nearest library.</p>
<p>“Asra! Glad you made it here safe.”</p>
<p>Julian spreads his arms. They don’t rise to meet him, their eyes again guarded without sunglasses. “I was in the area when you texted, so.”</p>
<p>“How fortunate.” Julian sits across from them and taps his foot. “Look, I, I’m sorry. We had—I had some good weeks with you. It was inconsiderate to ghost you like that.”</p>
<p>Asra breathes out. “I thought maybe I got too personal. Or not personal enough. I never seem to get that right.” They run a hand through their hair, which looks more ragged and less like seafoam now that they’re in the city.</p>
<p>Julian laughs mirthlessly. “You and me both. But no, it wasn’t your fault. I get—I get scared, sometimes. I may have, uh, projected. And I understand if you don't want to, ah, keep seeing me, but I...” Julian ruffles his own hair. All of his practice in the mirror has sunk from his mind's surface like an anchor. "Let's just say I've grown fond of you."</p>
<p>Asra studies him for a long moment. “It’s not like I’ve never disappeared without saying anything,” they say slowly. That’s not hard to imagine. “Water under the bridge?”</p>
<p>“Absolutely.” Julian breathes for the first time in too many days.</p>
<p>Asra ducks to root around their duffle bag. “I was going to—I thought you might like this.”</p>
<p>They press a small figurine into Julian’s hands. Carefully, Julian turns it over, finding a red seahorse ready to spring into motion. He chokes up.</p>
<p>“It’s beautiful.”</p>
<p>Asra seems to relax. “I was going for handsome.”</p>
<p>“The handsomest, clearly.” Julian sobers as he eyes Asra’s duffle bag. “Do you, ah, have anywhere to stay the night?”</p>
<p>“Not yet.”</p>
<p>“You’re welcome at my apartment.” Julian holds up his palms. “I’ll be a gentleman, I swear.”</p>
<p>Asra’s lips twitch. “We’ll see about that.”</p>
<p>Maybe Julian doesn’t mind being hurt, or maybe not everything soft and floaty stings. Either way, he stands and extends his hand.</p>
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